IMMEDIATE RELEASE August 5, 2014 CONTACT: Rickey Cole, (601) 969-2913 Democrats Reaching out to the Underserved, Forgotten Places JACKSON, MS- Yesterday, during the John C. Stennis Press Luncheon, the state Democratic Party Chairman Rickey Cole announced the Mississippi Democratic Rural Initiative. Following his announcement, he released this statement: “Today, 43 out of 82 of our Mississippi counties have fewer residents than in 1940. Mississippi has the highest unemployment rate in the country at 7.9 percent, with 37 of our counties having an unemployment rate of over 10 percent. It’s time to reach out to these neglected and forgotten communities. The Mississippi Democratic Rural Initiative will work with community leaders in these counties to promote policies that spur job creation, encourage entrepreneurship, reduce crime, and improve health care, education and quality of life in these regions. This initiative aims to promote policies to re-develop rural economies through infrastructure improvements, full digital access, community college vocational training support, development of local food systems/agribusiness, promotion of outdoor recreation, hunting, fishing and rural tourism. The initiative will advocate improving rural incomes by increasing the minimum wage and insisting upon equal pay for women. We must do a better job preventing crime in these areas. Our initiative seeks to improve support for rural law enforcement, reduce response time, and work to provide sheriffs with the tools they need to fight hillbilly heroin, otherwise known as crystal meth, and interstate drug trafficking epidemics that plague our rural areas. It all begins with education. That is why the Mississippi Democratic Rural Initiative promotes a state constitutional amendment to fully fund public education in Mississippi every year. These rural schools are the ones who suffer most from chronic school underfunding. Rural quality of life depends upon improved access to healthcare. Our initiative promotes expansion of health care coverage to 300,000 Mississippians to support full-service community hospitals, efficient emergency rooms, accessible clinics, and rapid response ambulance services. For eighteen of the last twenty-two years, Republicans have occupied the Governors Mansion. Throughout those years, the Republican leadership has routinely ignored rural Mississippians. Far too many of our rural communities have become Forgotten Places. Well, we Democrats have not forgotten about our rural citizens. The Mississippi Democratic Party is actively working to make the ‘Forgotten Places’ forgotten no longer. ###
Posted on: Tue, 05 Aug 2014 21:31:33 +0000
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